Love is Only a Word
by annaisadinosaur
Summary: Draco and Luna. Because love was only a word, and it didn't matter if they said it aloud, as long as it was really there.


**Love is Only a Word**

_and words are for just for the ears, anyway_

* * *

He didn't remember the context, but she had said to him once, head on his shoulder, snowy blonde hair getting lost in the color of his, "Because every man dies, but not every man really lives."

And he remembered trying to think of something to say, but the world around him was so cold and she was so warm, and Draco had never been one for words. His throat felt like ice as he glanced down at her and asked, "What, so women live forever then?"

She'd laughed, a warm breath suspended in the air that climbed upwards like a gymnast. He remembered that too clearly. "I guess so. Sounds nice, doesn't it?"

He thought for a moment then said, "No."

She always surprised him. Even then, when she moved into his side, nestling herself into the form of his body. The feeling of her next to him spread a kind of heat through his chest, and it only ignited when he felt her breath on his neck and she whispered, "I know."

* * *

He could remember autumn, the one before that winter.

He had told her early on that if he was going to have her around, she would have to cut it out with all the nonsensical jibber jabber. No Wrathpurts, or Nackles, or whatever it was she always went on about.

And he was definitely _not_ going to read the Quibbler.

After he'd announced it, she'd stared at him with that kind of look that seemed to glaze you right over, seeing nothing. But Luna was not of the same standards as the average human being, and her gaze was oddly penetrating. He felt nearly uncomfortable.

It was gone within an instant, however, when Luna broke her eyes away and began to lean towards him slowly.

His mind began to swivel about madly because that was _certainly_ not what he meant, at least not... no, what was she going to do, honestly? Was she that bold? She couldn't just—

Luna snatched the paper from his lap, and leaned back with the most inconspicuous glint of mischievousness in her expression. If Draco hadn't had better tact, his jaw might have very well been on the floor.

"What?" she asked, folding the paper over onto itself. "If you can't read the Quibbler, then you can't read the Prophet, either."

After a few thousand consecutive blinks, he huffed, "Fine," through his teeth. He'd never admit, maybe even to himself, that if she _had_ tried to kiss him then, he wouldn't have stopped her.

* * *

He remembered spring, the one that followed the frozen recesses of that winter and drove out his dark, the dark he thrived in.

She was just so _frustrating_. He could lash out all he liked but it was more like striking straight into the wind. She made him want to pull his hair out and break things and slam the door and lock it for eternity.

He didn't know why she still stuck around him when he so obviously didn't _like _her. He didn't like the little pesky creatures that buzzed around her head and he didn't like her radish earrings. He didn't like that goddamned yellow sundress that lit up beneath his eyelids whenever he was trying to sleep, and he didn't like the way she fit around him like the very air he breathed.

Draco was fractured, and Luna fit into the gaps like puzzle pieces. He knew, too, because Draco wasn't dumb. Just stubborn.

* * *

The summer after that was even harder to forget.

"You're delusional, Lovegood."

She was unbalanced, physically, at least. Perched on her toes, like she was waiting for a gust to blow her over to the ground. "I thought we were on a first name basis by now?"

"Look, I didn't give you permission to loiter on my doorstep, so I'd suggest you leave now."

She made a soft noise like a _hmph_, falling back and catching herself on her heels. "You know, I'm almost disappointed. The Draco I know would have certainly threatened to use at least two of the Unforgivable curses."

"Fine! _Luna_, are you happy? Leave. Luna, go."

She shrugged and twisted a bit in her stance. "Okay, Draco. I don't think I'm the one being delusional, though."

* * *

The air at the Ministry that morning had been much too thick, and for the beginning of autumn, the weather was particularly cold. Draco was practically fresh out of Hogwarts, young enough where the old Ministry warts had some reason to fear him usurping their positions in favor of his many years to come, but young enough where their years of age and experience made them evidently and arrogantly _superior_. Hence why no one moved out of the way for him when he tried to make his way through the suffocating paths and corridors. After shoving his way ungracefully through the tumult, Draco had managed to make it through the doors of the elevator before it slid shut.

A girl had held it open for him, and he'd hardly looked at her once before the doors bounced off of each other and then tightened to a close. He fumbled with his briefcase, mind abuzz with worry over his interview... If he were late, he couldn't even fathom how he'd recover from that mortification. And, worse, if he discovered Granger already had a position in the same department, well, he might just off himself right then and there.

It wasn't until the elevator had almost reached his floor that he glanced over at the woman, and after he had done so, he quickly regretted it. Draco had never been one to blush, but his face _did_ get rather instantly hot then.

Luna Lovegood was staring at him, the girl that had once been a Ravenclaw at his school, just a year below him. Not to mention the very same girl that had once been a prisoner in his own home. The latter was what fancied him incapable of movement. She just looked at him with big, grey eyes, a calm expression that seemed to wish nothing of him. And he couldn't help but remember what they had done to her, how they'd taken her from her own father and thrown her into the dark with little hope.

It wasn't until the doors opened that she finally spoke. "It's okay. You don't have to apologize for anything."

It was her floor, just one before his, and she left.

* * *

It was winter, but not _that_ winter - the one a year before, the one where things had been cold, but not freezing.

She stretched her arms over her head, and he thought she looked kind of like a star. Which was odd, because wasn't she supposed to be the moon?

"I think it's okay to love things," Luna was saying. She lowered her arms, taking in a deep, heavy breath. Her hands grazed the snow on the wooden railing as she stared out into the night. "I mean, I love Christmas."

He didn't really say anything that he could remember. She was used to it, though.

She turned her head and met his eyes. They were the same as always, and he liked that about her. Her hair curled down her neck and past her shoulder, somewhere at her waist, maybe.

"I love you, I think," Luna said quietly. Not because she was afraid, because she really was quite bold. Maybe it was the last part that made her voice soft. _I think_. "They're just words, Draco. They're okay."

"You're mental," he whispered.

"Words don't really mean anything, anyway," she said, and he noticed that either she'd moved closer, or he had. He was pretty sure it had been him. "We already know what's true. Words are just for the ears. We don't need them. We've already got everything we need."

* * *

There was so much Draco didn't think about now. He didn't think about the order of things, only of the pivotal moments, where things were right or things were so wrong. And the beginning, it certainly didn't matter, at least, not any more than the end.

Truth be told, there was much he didn't think of because he didn't remember. Like the day at work when he'd run into her - _again_ - and had finally inclined to Luna's persistence, then proceeding to _rant _and _rave_ till he was blue in the face about that damn report that the Minister had assigned him to do. He couldn't remember what they'd said, or how she'd looked at him, or even how he'd looked at her, but he remembered her being there and just listening and laughing. Laughing. Really, honest to Merlin, laughing.

He didn't really remember the first time she'd been to his flat, or why. He just knew that sometimes she came, and sometimes she'd talk to him and he'd listen and pretend he didn't. Sometimes, he'd talk, and she'd make things out of nothing, drawing pretty stories out of empty words. And then other times she'd just drift around the place, dancing and singing and cleaning (why she did that, he had no idea), and then would leave in just the same manner.

He didn't remember her face when he'd pushed her away time and time again. (Probably because he hadn't looked.) He didn't remember how it felt when he decided he'd never see her again and that he wouldn't let her just float around him anymore like she always had.

He did remember how it felt to have her in his arms, though. It felt wrong.

(But there's always something small and indistinct about what we think is _wrong_ that feels so strangely right.)

* * *

Draco should have brought another coat, but he honestly hadn't thought about it. Which was a curious thing for him to do, because Draco always thought about things five times over. According to Astoria, anyways. She'd scolded him as he started to leave, because it was _Scorpius's Christmas holiday and they needed to spend time with their son_, but as much as he loved his wife and as much as he loved his son, the article on the last page of the week old Daily Prophet (he'd seemed to have broken his promise) had lit a distinct fire in the soles of his feet that made him incapable of staying still.

The coat didn't really matter, though, because he was already absorbed in an inexplicable cold that no measly article of clothing could save him from.

He'd come as soon as he'd heard. It had been an instinctive action, and that alone drove a knife through his chest. The fact that she, an entire universe away now, could have such an effect over him, still...

His knees dug into the white of the snow. Bells sounded somewhere off into the distance, and when he closed his eyes, he thought that he could hear caroling ringing out in the still air. But that could just have been Luna, singing a whisper in his head. So much about this was wrong. The cold, Christmas, Luna. More importantly Luna.

And the words etched in stone, _Luna Lovegood Scamander_, _3 December, 1980 – 14 December, 2023_, were harsh and strident to see, even when he closed his eyes and couldn't see at all.

He sunk further into the snow, the top of his skin freezing over like ice, ice like the color of his eyes, ice like the death that decorated the pavements.

And then he laughed. He didn't know how, but he did, a kind of broken laugh, one he wished he'd had years earlier, when it had just been the two of them in an empty, quiet flat, where love had thrived in the cold and shrunk away from the rising sun.

"You told me that women lived forever," he said and shook his head slowly, gazing down at his hands. He was, obviously, speaking more to himself than any flimsy, celestial being. "But words are just words. They don't mean anything if you already know what's true."

That day in the winter, so far away now, returned to him slowly, with the strange, sugar-coated words, "_Because every man dies, but not every man really lives_."

He suddenly remembered why she'd said it. He remembered the warm hand on his face and the tickle of butterbeer down his throat. And then from somewhere came the feeling of her gently beckoning lips on his own, drawing every chill from his blood and lighting his veins on fire. He kissed her back like he'd never kissed anyone in his life. And that fit, because there was no one quite like Luna.

The snow returned to him, gently brushing over his hands that may or may not really have been there. And he thought to himself that that day, the day that he had kissed Luna, was the first he had ever really lived.

And, also, somewhat more peculiarly, he found himself wondering what the hell a Nargle was.

* * *

**Thanks for reading, lovelies. My very first attempt at a Draco/Luna, to be perfectly honest. Written for the Quidditch European Cup Competition, round two, with Christmas vacation and "Every man dies, but not every man really lives" as my prompts. WIGTOWN WANDERERS, WOOHH! You should read my team's stuff, by the way. (smilelaughread, kitty132383, WentToManderleyAgain)**

**Leave a review and you'll be the greatest person ever. Let me know if I've disgraced the Draco/Luna ship forever and stuff. x**


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